


what you want; what you need

by pastellar



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: M/M, Unrequited Love, but is it r e ally, kageyama doesn't handle pining well
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-12
Updated: 2020-01-07
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:14:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21765109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pastellar/pseuds/pastellar
Summary: kageyama has some idea of what romance is supposed to be, but he's never bothered to understand it. all he really knows at this point is that the term is "crush" for a reason.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio
Comments: 7
Kudos: 37





	1. shiner

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is sort of angsty, but i want to resolve it in the end B' ) i can't deal with a c tua l unrequited love, so even if i don't finish this, pls keep in mind that yEs hinata is totally gonna reciprocate.........kageyama is just bein dumb

Kageyama is new to this. It really sucks— he hasn’t been new to anything in years. He is always ahead, quicker, better, more knowledgeable than anyone else.

He remembers thinking that in this, too, he was better. He would hear his teammates teasing each other over girls, and he would scoff, because he was above that. He would roll his eyes.

This must be what divine retribution is like.

“Kageyama! Over here! Come _on!”_

Hinata’s fire-bright hair swirls around his head as he jumps, one arm flopping dramatically in the air to get his attention. He seems to think Kageyama can’t focus on him today.

He _wishes._

He serves the ball in a hurry, cursing as soon as he realizes it isn’t going to arc at the angle he wants. Not that Hinata will know; he’s already sprinting over, shoes pounding the floor. He flies underneath it, right where the net meets the out-of-bounds line, and it goes up and over.

The aim is to pump up his reflexes even more, train natural ability to the point that it becomes supernatural. He needs to be able to read the ball in half a millisecond and then _go._ He’s definitely going, so now Kageyama just needs to trim the half a second it takes him down to a third, a quarter. Rinse and repeat until his reflexes have reflexes.

Hinata’s getting it more or less right every time. He should be content.

He grits his teeth and serves again.

He can remember when he started to suspect something was different. It was lunchtime, and he’d passed Hinata on the way to the bathroom. He was bouncing, or humming, or doing _something_ immensely childish that Kageyama turned around to stare at, and Tanaka had clapped a hand on his back out of nowhere. He couldn’t help jerking.

“Man, I thought you were looking at a girl!” Tanaka guffawed. “You had a sparkle in your eyes.”

That was more of a jolt than the back-slap was. Something raw and beaten inside of him wanted very much to snap at his teammate.

He washed his hands a few moments later, still pushing down that anger. He couldn’t look at Hinata for the rest of the day without something burning in his chest.

He puts more power in his serve this time, and Hinata has to leap to get it. _Good,_ says his heart, and it burns. It burns.

Hinata loves the world. He has never felt that way, never been able to gasp or smile with that kind of wonder. It reminds him of the poets he barely studies in Japanese class, and their love for beautiful, unsullied nature; Hinata is something pure and wonderful.

But Kageyama knows what kills him the most. He sees it the most in practice, ironically— the one place they’re required to be together, the one place he can’t avoid him.

Dedication.

When he finds the perfect girl, Kageyama knows he’ll be as committed to her as he is to volleyball. As he is to breathing. That tireless drive…that’s what he loves about him.

Something chokes in his throat, and he slams the ball away so hard that he sees stars. Hinata’s eyes are wide as he glances over at his face, but he throws himself into running as soon as the ball takes flight.

It soars over the net, pushed higher than it should have been. For a second he resigns himself to the idea of watching him skid to a halt…letting it bounce down to earth…turning back to him. _“What the heck was that?”_

But he knows Hinata too well. And Hinata knows him.

He doesn’t slow down, let alone stop. His shoes scream against the wood floor as he skids underneath the net, and he blurs himself beneath the ball and it cracks, breathless as Kageyama is, up and to the side.

When it falls to the ground, it lands somewhere in the back of his mind; he will not take his eyes from Hinata. He’s breathing heavily— Kageyama can feel the heat of it, even all these yards away -but he stares right back.

He has never allowed himself the thought of kissing him. But with all this adrenaline in his bloodstream, the carefully molded balance of his brain crumbles into the idea of taking him by the shoulders and shaking him and saying against his mouth, you dumbass, don’t you _understand?!_

He opens his mouth to say something, but Kageyama doesn’t hear it. He has already slammed the door shut behind him.


	2. breaker

Kageyama knows he was weird last night. He knows he let himself get caught up in...whatever the hell is going on inside the organ that pumps his blood. But that doesn’t mean he has to admit it to anyone, not even the person he actually _does_ admit things to on occasion. Not even to Hinata. _Especially_ not to Hinata.

He is afraid.

It’s an uncomfortable feeling, downright irritating when he lets it get to him. He hasn’t felt like this in ages, not since—

_“You toss to me just fine. It makes no difference to me.”_

Shit. The idiot’s mixed up in everything.

He crushes gravel under his shoes, trudging along the path to school with his back hunched. His hands clench inside his pockets; he wants to grip the worn, textured surface of a volleyball, thump it against the gymnasium floor, clap his hands around it when it rebounds. But Hinata’s going to be there.

The miserable inescapability of it all just makes him want to go practice even more, and who cares if the dumbass is there, it’s not like he has to talk to him. But the frail, trembly part of his brain that he hates so intensely quails that he’s going to _feel_ things whether he talks to him or not. He could hit something. He wants to hit a volleyball. He wants to hit Hinata.

He doesn’t have class with him, at least. That’s good. But there’s no distraction there— the only thing powerful enough to take his mind off Hinata is the gym, the net, the sting of his palm after a good spike or a perfect toss _to Hinata—_

Damn it all, he needs to get over this.

English sucks, the same as always. He tries to pay attention for about two minutes, desperate for a reprieve from _he thinks you’re weird he doesn’t want you you screwed up you_ king, but old habits die hard. He doesn’t care enough about verb tenses to put in any more effort.

Lunch rolls around. He punches the buttons on the vending machine with more vigor than usual, stabs the box of milk with a straw, sips angrily, and wonders briefly if it’s possible for boxed milk to go sour. Everything else has. Why not?

He drinks it all in two more gulps. Wipes his mouth with the back of one hand.

He can see Hinata watching him from the other side of the yard.

He chokes on the milk going down his throat, bending over and putting his palms to his knees, partly to steady himself as he coughs and partly to get his face out of Hinata’s line of sight. He’s gonna kill him for being so stupid, staring like an idiot and almost killing him.

He hears quick footsteps approaching and whips his head up just in time to see Hinata slam a hand down on his back. “Don’t choke!” he hears. It sounds shrill.

“The hell?!” He coughs one more time. “I’m not choking, you dumbass, it’s _milk,_ can you choke on fucking milk?!”

Hinata hits him again one more time. “Just in case!”

They wind up tussling, and it’s almost like normal, slaps on Kageyama’s arms and a fist in his stomach. Some of the tension in his gut dissipates. But he can’t forget- not when he’s grabbing at Hinata’s wrists, trying to get him off and accidentally feeling the way his pulse skitter under his fingers -and he shoves him away just a little more roughly than usual. Hinata blinks at him from five feet away.

“Kageyama?”

It’s a question. He scowls— like hell he’s gonna answer. Hinata squints and sighs.

“Geez, you don’t need to _throw_ me! Even if you’re pissed, that’s totally unfair.”

“Shut up, dumbass. You hit me first.”

Hinata puffs his cheeks out in indignation, but he doesn’t retort. Instead he sits down on the ground, squatting and crossing his arms over his knees like a kid.

Kageyama doesn’t know what to make of this.

“...Oi. You just gonna sit there?”

He never thought Hinata would just _ignore_ a direct question, because he’s loud and excitable and just so Hinata about everything. But it’s happening right in front of his eyes: the other boy isn’t even looking up.

“Hey, I asked you a question.” His brow furrows in irritation.

A small reaction; Hinata’s head tilts toward him. Then he tries to cover it up, shoving his face into his legs, but Kageyama’s not stupid and he’s not enjoying being treated like he is. The whole day has sucked. The whole _week_ has sucked.

“If you’re just going to be stupid, go do it somewhere else,” he mutters.

Hinata pops up again. He frowns. “Why are you being so weird? You always let me sit by you at lunchtime.”

“I’m _not_ being weird.” It’s a blatant lie, but if he puts enough vehemence into it maybe he’ll believe it.

“Are too!” Hinata springs up off the ground, and Kageyama takes an involuntary step back. “I don’t like this! You’re so weird all the time, now, and even when we practice! You don’t even _high-five_ me anymore!”

“Who cares about high-fives?! What are you, a kid?”

“It’s your fault that practice sucks!”

“I know!”

Kageyama’s fists are clenched tightly against his legs, and he looks down at the ground with shameful anger whirling through his insides. “Damn it,” he chokes out. “I know it’s my fault.”

Hinata’s face goes slack, all the righteous fury collapsing and draining away. Kageyama doesn’t see any more; he keeps his eyes on the dirt. Now he’s done it, said something stupidly incriminating, and he can feel the thud of a failed toss reverberate through his bones.

But the seconds stretch on without a response. Nothing. From what he can see of Hinata’s shoes, he’s not moving either, and the gut-wrenching silence is killing him.

Finally: “Are you just...tense?” Hinata’s voice has an edge to it.

It’s the very palest shadow of the truth, but it’s something. “Yeah.” He grumbles it, letting his fists uncurl. Looking a little higher.

The only warning he gets is one, two crunches of gravel under sneaker soles, and then his neural circuitry goes dark with the shock of two small, strong arms around his waist. He cannot breathe. Never in his very best and brightest dreams has he ever pictured something so incredible as this.

A hug.

“This helps Natsu calm down,” Hinata says against his chest. His chest— his face, it’s right there— “You’re the same age mentally, so it should work for you too.”

It is a measure of how supremely awed he is that he doesn’t even retort with words. He makes a noise that’s halfway between a grunt and a scoff, and he wonders if God is laughing at him, somewhere far away in the cloudless sky.

After a moment he realizes that usually, when people are hugged, they hug back. He feels vaguely like Hinata is expecting something like that, because he still hasn’t pulled away, almost as if he’s waiting for it. No, scratch that— he’s definitely waiting for it. He just heard a snort.

Kageyama scowls and lifts his arms. He pauses to wonder if he’s doing it right, then decides that it doesn’t matter anyway, Hinata better be grateful that he’s even _letting_ himself be hugged, and he slaps both arms together around the other boy’s back with a vengeance. He hears a startled noise from down below.

Now that he’s hugging back the experience is completely different. He can feel warmth seeping through the front of his shirt, and it must only be that that’s making his chest hurt. His hands tighten a little on Hinata’s shoulder blades, and he has to force himself to relax his grip.

Warm, warm, warm, curvature of muscle under his fingertips and Hinata’s cheek pressed to him. Body to body. He’s holding him close enough to lean down and— and—

Hinata’s face tilts up. Their eyes meet. “Kageyama, your heartbeat is super—”

He kisses him.

His ribcage feels like a prism, light screaming through the sides and crashing into each bone as it tries to escape, frantic, pulsing desperation. His mouth is in flames. Wreckage. Gentle lips underneath his.

 _You can’t_ do _this._

He wrenches himself away with a gasp- it was only a second, only a second but he cannot breathe -and shoves Hinata away from him by the shoulders. His mind is a cacophony of balls thudding to the floor, _taking what you want and you don’t care do you it’s just_ you _and he’s the most important thing in the world what have you done?_

Hinata’s face is flushed red, up to the roots of his hair and down to his neck. His arms come down from where they still reach for Kageyama’s torso, and he glances to the side of the yard in embarrassment.

No one else ever comes over by the vending machine to eat, but Kageyama does a double take anyway. He exhales.

“Uh…” Hinata’s voice is shallow. “Or we can do that. Does...d-does that...help...more?”

He doesn’t know what to say to that; his brain is still reeling with adrenaline. He can barely process the fact that Hinata isn’t running away screaming— forget understanding the words that just came out of his mouth. “Uh…”

_Help...more…_

Wait. Wait.

What?

“Yeah,” he’s saying before he can stop himself, his face burning and getting hotter by the second. “Yeah.”

Hinata is still bright red. Still, obviously, flustered and jumpy. But he sets his jaw and his eyes go flint-hard, the way they do when someone sets up a particularly high wall in front of him and tells him he can’t make it over.

Kageyama cannot pretend that he isn’t head over heels for that look.

Hinata drags him back down and kisses him again, forcefully, both fists clenched tight in his shirt. It isn’t fireworks or anything, it really just feels like they shoved their faces together, because that’s what they’re doing, but his heart thuds with the intensity of a spike nailed into the floor.

When he pulls away, when Hinata yelps something unintelligible and runs off to class, when he presses his fingers to his mouth...he's pretty sure he's dreaming.

He wonders when he's going to wake up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> iiiiiiiii haven't seen season one in forever so i pulled some of that from my (very bad) memory
> 
> i hope this was enjoyable !! i might do a third chapter! probably ;0 we'll see

**Author's Note:**

> this is sort of angsty, but i want to resolve it in the end B' ) i can't deal with a c tua l unrequited love, so even if i don't finish this, pls keep in mind that yEs hinata is totally gonna reciprocate.........kageyama is just bein dumb


End file.
